The Supreme Court on Friday allowed a free passage to Italian marine Massimilano latorre to travel home for four months in order to help him recovery early from a recent brain stroke.
latorre, who is one of the two marines facing trial for killing two Indian fishermen on high seas gave a personal undertaking to Court to return after four months. His undertaking was also supported by the Republic of Italy which submitted a sovereign undertaking through its Ambassador Daniele Mancini to vouch for the marine's return.
The bench headed by Chief Justice RM lodha faced no difficulty to pass an order after the Centre agreed to allow the Italian to travel to his home despite the trial all set to start. Another application filed by a witness in the case that demanded medical examination of latorre stood withdrawn by his counsel in the Court.
The bench, however, had its doubts over the legal efficacy of enforcing the undertaking given by the accused. It also raised objections on the "ambiguous" undertaking by latorre where he talked about his reservation to the Indian agencies initiating a case against him.
"An undertaking should be plain, unequivocal and unambiguous," said the bench, also comprising Justices Kurian Joseph and Rohington Nariman. It refused to accept the undertaking and directed latore to file a fresh undertaking on the lines of the other undertaking given by the Ambassador mentioning about his travel period and an undertaking to return by such time and abide by conditions previously imposed by the Court.
Senior advocate Soli Sorabjee who appeared for latorre requested Court to consider the Ambassador's undertaking. "He requires good home environment, continued medication and rest," Sorabjee said.The bench granted the request and said that the condition for latorre's release would be same as set by the apex court on February 22 2013.